Flash developer ttursas has already made a couple of games inspired by Super Stacker and 99 Bricks (which are, in turn, very similar to ngmoco's iPhone game Topple). While the physics engine ttursas has been using seems very solid and reliable, with none of the bounciness of similar games, they were still just regular old free-form stacking challenges without much personality. That changes with Perfect Balance, a game so confident in its influence, it constantly reminds you to breathe.

"RELAX," Perfect Balance says, as your fragile tower yields to the chasm. "TAKE A DEEP BREATH," it says, as you foolishly balance a circle on a triangle, hoping that the law of gravity will be distracted by pretty lights for five seconds and let you get away with it. "HEY, MAYBE THAT ISN'T AS STUPID AS IT LOOKS. OH, DANG, I GUESS IT WAS. TRY AGAIN, MORON." Okay, it doesn't say that last one.

But you know that's what it's thinking.

Perfect Balance is an 80-level puzzle game that asks you to… wait for it… balance a collection of shapes… wait for it… perfectly on a tiny jutting spire, or maybe a slanted line, or a sprinkle of floating cubes. It never looks easy, although some of the really hellish-looking levels turn out to be rather straightforward, and some of the relatively simple-looking ones are fronting for explosive migraines.

To place a block, just pick it up with a click of the mouse, then click somewhere else to drop it. Rotate a block you're holding with [A] and [D]. You don't get to replace a block once it's chosen, or move it once you've put it into play, so no touchies unless you mean it. This is a thoughtful game. TAKE A DEEP BREATH. RELAX. TAKE A DEEP BREATH. TAKE A DEEP BREATH. RELAX.

Analysis: What really sets Perfect Balance apart is the atmosphere, which has sort of a heavy-handed salvation/damnation theme. The first half of the game, "Harmony," comes with a random microscope-assisted picture of some skin cells (correct me if I'm wrong) in the background, spacey music, and tinkly zen sound effects that are supposed to be calming but start to sound like mockery after you've watched a few doomed triangles tumble serenely off into nothingness.

Once you defeat the first 40 levels, you get to try them in "Inferno" mode. That means the blocks are more numerous and difficult (not to mention blood-stained), the music turns into a surreal industrial caterwauling, and the background becomes an equally random red-tinted hotel room. Inspired by Sartre's Huis Clos, I hope. It looks pretty comfortable, for an inferno.

I enjoy how the puzzles ask you to understand different properties of physics, including friction and inertia. It was while stacking eight isosceles triangles on a 45 degree slope that I realized most physics games would never ask such a thing of me, and I felt the broadening vistas of transcendence that come with performing a seemingly-impossible feat without violating any natural laws. Like juggling. Or playing a minor chord. Or flirting. And then it's all RELAX. TAKE A DEEP BREATH. TINKLE TINKLE ZEN ZEN ZEN and I realized I was just playing a game. But it was a magical moment.

1. Balance the square in the middle.
2. Balance the long stick on top of the square (make sure it's in the exact middle)
3. Put the 2 circles next to each other on the stick (somewhat quickly, or they'll roll off)
4. Put the square in the dent between the circles. If you did it right, the square should stop the circles from rolling off.

First one, long side against bar. Rest stack one by one on top in a tall column. You have to be very careful on each placement as otherwise they all slide, but I guess you have found that out already...

[Edit: Fixed your angle bracket smiley. Please use &lt; and &gt; instead of typing just the angle brackets, because in HTML they have special meaning and can mess up the page. Please use Preview to be sure your comment appears as you expect. Thank you! -Jay]

you need to place the pieces as wide apart as possible without making it collapse. that way you should have enough space to put the smaller circle next to the small circle thats on the red piece in the middle

I there was a lot of trial and error the whole way through, and I really would have liked a skip button or something, or the ability to unlock smaller level sets after a certain number are completed. I also found it slightly frustrating that some of the angles bars you stack on arent at the same rotation as some of the shapes, so every peice has to fall just a little, but that can end up knocking everything off...

I found it to be an awesome game. One problem that I have is that the Inferno levels don't really have any consequence for loss. In the first set, you can't go on to the next level without beating the current one. In Inferno, you can skip to whichever level you want. For some reason, that irks me.

huh, I don't know why but I found this game almost laughably easy on Harmony. I generally would just wedge the blocks in so they didn't move- done! If there was any kind of level design or progression going on here, I definitely missed it? Maybe because I wasn't trying to stack? I think level 38 and 39 were some of the easiest by far though. Inferno is giving me way more trouble, stuck on 5... :)

Kind of disappointed, after beating every single challenge both on Harmony AND Inferno, I got no congratulatory message or acknowledgment for my efforts. It felt like a flat and hollow victory. "Shows over, don't care where you go but you can't stay here" sort of thing...

I really liked this: Great physics, just gotta love that friction going on.
Agreed for a while with the general dissatisfaction about not being able to de-select the pieces, but later on it didn't matter, it sort of made me think a bit harder, so to say, before I made any decision as I progressed: And that is almost always a good thing.
Thanks a lot to jimbog for showing off his solutions! Helped me a couple of times when I was absolutely stucked, and brought me a different joy when I had it solved all by myself and - in my own opinion - in an much more elegant manner ... :)
Just one thing, I don't see the point in this: You can get stucked in "Harmony", and suddenly you are free to skip levels in "Inferno" - why?

I really enjoyed the Harmony levels, but being able to skip levels freely in Inferno somehow makes the game lose some of its charm. It also seems a bit counterintuitive--in a set called "Inferno," you would think you would be forced to solve each level before progressing.

Anyway, I think there is something to be said for keeping levels locked until you've solved the previous levels. It creates a sense of achievement.

As for the gameplay itself, it seems spot on to me, minor glitches aside.

One more thing: great to see many of the levels designed to allow more good solutions. I managed to solve levels with creations that triggered the "it just cannot be the solution the designers had in mind" feeling - an inevitable feeling with really great puzzle type games :)

Created a hilarious solution to 33.
Actually how I won most of these with more than two platforms, but this is the most extreme because you have to be FAST to get these in.http://yfrog.com/3uinnovationp

By the way, that so-called cheating method? You can do it legit with the blue ball too.
Pick up the grey bar and hit A. Drop. Quickly nab a blue ball and place it just as the grey bar is coming down, and there you have it, same effect as the 'cheat'

also on Jayisgames

chrpa—
It's Retro Weekday Escape time and four atmospheric and magic games are waiting for you! We start in enchanting and tidy room by 10 Color Dots, full of lavender smell. After we leave it, Kiterescu takes us first to the...
...

chrpa—
The new game from Bart Bonte is sharp yellow and black. The first-signal system activates! Wasps! Hornets! Caution Bio-Hazard! Caution Wet Floor! Slow Down! The last one is correct, no need to hurry anywhere, we've got awesome relaxing game with...
...

chrpa—
Huzzah! Tesshi-e is back with another excellent game! First, don't panic after you notice the intro screen you've seen before. Yes, it's from The Escape Hotel 3: Remake released last summer. Tesshi-e just revisited his favourite hotel, lost his way...
...

chrpa—
Hi! The new Weekday Escape is here bringing three fantastic games! Lutaru gives us a box for playing, with a small button here and a tiny hole there and waits until we figure out what to do with it. After...
...

JayIsGames offers a free online experience with the best free online games. You can read our daily honest reviews and walkthroughs, play games, discuss about them. JayIsGames.com is a leading Flash and Online game review site. Since 2003, we review every day only the best, including casual games, flash games, arcade games, indie games, download games, shooting games, escape games, RPG games, puzzle games, mobile games and much more.
Submit a Game: Don't just read reviews or play games on JayIsGames.com, submit them! Submit your game now and we might release it in homepage. Use our game submission form.
Check us back often! We add new games every day and only the best games!